Regional News

Bloomberg China’s imports of liquefied natural gas in November surged 53 percent to a record as the nation scrambles to meet fuel shortages amid peak winter demand and government’s drive to cut coal use. LNG imports rose 53 percent from the same month last year to 4.06 million metric tons, according to data posted on the website of the General ...

Bloomberg Oil demand may jump in the new year as US refiners plan to take fewer units offline than last winter, freeing them up to churn out more fuel. Crude unit shutdowns in the first two months of the year are expected to be 35 percent below winter 2017, according to data from Energy Aspects Ltd. March outages are seen ...

RIYADH / REUTERS Saudi Arabia aims to start talks with Washington within weeks on an agreement to allow US firms to participate in its nascent civilian nuclear energy programme, with the first tender expected in 2018, the kingdom’s energy minister said. Saudi Arabia is interested in reaching a civilian nuclear cooperation agreement with Washington, and Riyadh has invited US firms ...

Bloomberg Saudi Aramco is looking for natural gas assets from Russia to East Africa and the US as the kingdom’s state-owned energy giant hunts for ways to meet soaring domestic demand. The comments by Khalid Al-Falih, who’s both Aramco chairman and Saudi energy minister, are a tacit admission Aramco has failed to find enough domestic gas reserves despite years of ...

Bloomberg Pemex’s crude menu has just gotten simpler. If it’s the traditional, heavier Maya you’re after, step right up, but traders with a palate for lighter, sweeter crudes will have to look elsewhere. Isthmus exports fell almost 16 percent in November from the previous month while Pemex stopped sending Olmeca, Mexico’s light- est crude, for a third consecutive month, according ...

Bloomberg Congress is close to lifting a 40-year-old ban on energy development in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, but drilling for oil in that frozen wilderness may still be years away as the effort faces exhau- stive environmental reviews and likely lawsuits. It could be a decade or more before any well is drilled, following required environmental scrutiny and permit ...

Bloomberg The last survivor among a slew of major US nuclear power projects is getting one step closer to seeing the light of day. The project could become the first US nuclear plant licensed in recent years that gets to be built, following delays that sent total estimated costs soaring to more than $25 billion. “We hope a decision is ...

Bloomberg Pakistan’s drive to tackle its polluted skies has left it with a problem: It has more dirty fuel oil than it wants. Their solution? Swap it with shipments of cleaner liquefied natural gas. The top oil marketing firm in South Asia’s second-largest economy, Pakistan State Oil Co., is exploring whether it can take delivery of LNG cargoes in return ...

Bloomberg A Greek shipowner is predicting new rules for marine fuel will put thousands of the world’s merchant vessels out of business in the next two years, roiling global trade. In fact, he’s wagering $1.1 billion on it. Evangelos Marinakis, chairman of Capital Maritime & Trading Corp., based near Athens, says his company has invested that much in the last ...

Bloomberg Saudi Arabia expects oil revenue to jump 12 percent next year in a sign the world’s biggest crude exporter expects prices to keep rising in 2018. The top OPEC producer expects to collect 492 billion riyals ($131 billion) from oil sales in 2018, compared with 440 billion riyals this year, the Finance Ministry said in a budget statement. Oil ...